Chapter Text
Vi looks at the big clock on the far wall. 7:46AM. She’s one minute late today. Every morning for the past six months - well, every morning Vi’s been on shift, so she’s just assuming about the other days - she’s passed by at exactly 7:45AM, always at a brisk walk, always in a perfectly-tailored suit, not a single long, silky-looking hair out of place. The suits are a bunch of different colors, but she seems to prefer blue. Dark blue. Medium blue. Baby blue (that one’s Vi’s favorite). Lots of blue.
It’s a good color on her - complements her hair. Vi had thought for two months that her hair was black, but then the sun hit it at just the right angle, and it turned out it was dark blue. So, blue suits her. Vi’s not sure if she’s choosing her hair as the feature she's trying to highlight, or if blue also complements her eyes, because she always wears a pair of large, stylish sunglasses. Even when it’s cloudy.
7:47AM. The crisp clack of heeled boots on concrete pulls Vi's attention to the sidewalk. There must have been some sort of emergency, because the subject of Vi’s (minor) obsession walks past the fire station at a faster clip than normal. That's sort of saying something, because Mystery Woman’s got legs for days, long and slender, visibly toned with long, lean muscle through her suit pants. At the faster clip, Vi has less time to admire her ass and tiny, tiny waist as she walks by, but that’s fine, because she’s wearing the baby blue suit with a white button-down, and it makes her look better than any woman has the right to look. She’s there and then gone, and Vi feels a little sad to see her leave (though the view as she does is fucking fantastic).
“Damn.”
Vi hums her agreement before a laugh to her right pulls her out of her daze, and she realizes that Ekko’s observation had been about her, not to her. “This is pathetic, dude.”
Grumbling a bit, even though she (silently) agrees with him, she says without any real bite, “Lay off, Ekko.”
Vi finishes getting her coffee, which she does every morning she’s on shift at about 7:40AM, since the “Caffeination Station” - which is labeled with a brightly-colored homemade sign, courtesy of Powder - is right near the front of the fire house and, therefore, gives her a great view of the sidewalk, and the perfect excuse to not look like a total creep.
“It’s been, what, like, nine years? You stand here drooling over her every day, and you’ve never even talked to her. Your lack of game is honestly offensive.”
Vi shoots Ekko a glare, since she had thought they were finished with the conversation, and turns around with her coffee cup to start walking to the break room for the morning debrief.
There’s also coffee in the break room, and if anyone asks her, Vi walks to the little section of counter all the way at the front of the station because too many people use the coffee maker in the break room in the morning, and she likes the coffee from the little pods better. (She doesn’t. The pod machine always burns the hell out of the coffee. Shit, Ekko might be right.)
She can hear Ekko follow her after half a second, jogging to fall in next to her.
“Just ask her out. What’s the big deal? You’re always smooth at the bars we go to.”
Vi pretends to think about that for a second, as if she hasn’t been trying to figure out a way to ask out the completely stunning woman she’s been pining after for half a year since the very first day she heard those boots on the sidewalk and was nearly knocked flat on her ass by the gorgeous woman wearing them.
“I don’t know, Little Man. It’s different. I don't have to do much at the bars, you know? I don’t pick up anybody who hasn’t been checking me out.”
In her peripheral vision, Ekko's looking at her like she's got three heads. “Is that why you act like you’re allergic to sleeves when you’re picking your outfits to go out in?”
“Got it in one, Little Man.”
Ekko laughs at her again, whispering “unbelievable” to himself under his breath, and they grab their seats as their conversation fades into the chatter in the break room while everybody waits for Vander to start the debrief.
Vi takes a sip of her coffee and tries not to make a face - the sugar and vanilla creamer Vi dumps into the pathetic excuse for coffee do less to cover up the burned taste than she’d like.
Ekko leans over to her, shit-eating grin spreading across his face. “You know…you could just show her July on the calendar.”
Vi almost spits out her mouthful of disgusting coffee at the idea of showing Mystery Woman the house’s yearly calendar…and the July photo of her that’s become sort of infamous for helping the station sell a record number of calendars. Lots of pent-up housewives in Piltover, Vi guesses.
“Might help you find out if she’s into all that.” Ekko nods vaguely at her torso, seeming to be referring to her muscled, tattooed arms, ridged abdominals, and, most important in a situation where the goal is to get a woman to say “yes” to a date: her tits.
Because, oh yeah, of course: Vi has no idea if Mystery Woman is even into women.
Vi’s never actually spoken one word to her, so she doesn't know jack shit about her. She could be married to some equally tall, perfect guy. Vi frowns a little at the thought as Vander shows up at the front of the room and starts getting everybody quieted down to start the debrief.
______
At 7:39AM the next morning, Vi’s making her way over to the stupid pod machine, ready to abuse her tastebuds for what feels like the millonth time in the name of the nicest view in town when she spots Ekko walking toward her. He’s grinning.
She ignores him, getting to the counter and looking over the selection of pods, praying that this is the day she finds a kind that doesn’t make her want to wash her mouth out with soap like she’s heard Piltovan nannies do to kids who swear.
Deciding that no, actually, there’s no way that this pod machine is ever going to make her something she wants to drink, she grabs a random pink one and slams it into the machine, setting her mug underneath the spout and hitting the button to warm up the water with more force than necessary.
It's worth it for the view, but Vi really hates bad coffee.
Vi watches the little, blinking button on the side of the machine that will tell her when the water’s heated up enough to torch her coffee beyond recognition.
Ekko watches her watch the button. Vi watches the button stop flashing, and presses it. Ekko watches the boiling hot water stream out of the machine. Vi watches her cup fill slowly, her nose fucking assaulted by the smell of her stupid, burned bean water. Ekko watches Vi grab the sugar bowl and dump three large spoonfuls in.
Vi decides she can’t take it anymore. “Fucking what?”
Ekko raises one white eyebrow at the hostility. “Nothing. I just think it’s sweet that you have a whole little morning routine for a woman you’ve never spoken to.”
Vi has a feeling that "sweet" actually means "fucking hilarious," mostly because he's very obviously trying not to smile.
“Shut up, I just like to get my coffee at this time every day.”
Ekko snorts.
Vi glares.
“Dude, I love you, but you are the least subtle person I have ever met.”
Vi glares some more.
“I’m serious. Literally everybody here knows you’re waiting for Legs to go walking by.”
Vi, who had been dumping a concerning amount of vanilla creamer into her sugary hell concoction looks up at him, alarmed. “No, the fuck they don’t…do they?”
Vi looks around the station, noting with horror that, yes, every other person in the front room of the station is surreptitiously watching her. Greg’s sweeping the same patch of floor over and over. And she’s pretty sure she sees Mylo hand Claggor some bills.
Motherfucker .
Vi groans lightly, turning back to her coffee and dejectedly staring at the mottled beige and white mixture, grumbling about the “goddamn traitors” she works with. She grabs a coffee stirrer, sticks it between her teeth, and glances at the big clock, because she’s almost done with her coffee, which means Mystery Woman - or “Legs,” apparently - should be walking by any second now.
She’s right. It’s now 7:44AM.
Ekko sighs heavily as he notices her checking the clock and comments, “Okay, this is officially sad.”
He pulls the little notepad he always carries out of his back pocket and slaps it on the counter a few steps down from Vi and starts writing something. Vi walks to the fridge, curious about what he's doing but not that pressed about it. Ekko’s always writing shit down. Notes from jobs, ideas for ways to improve station management or their gear, random doodles, stuff like that.
But, this time, Ekko tears the page he’s been working on out of the notebook and waves it at Vi as he walks farther away from her and toward the front of the station.
As he walks too far away for her to grab him, Vi just barely registers what looks like her name in bold print at the top of the page…and numbers below it.
Shit.
She glances at the clock in a panic. And hears the clack of a boot heel.
7:45AM. Right on time and in a beige suit today for a change, Vi dimly notes, frozen to her spot by the “Caffeination Station” as Ekko, the little traitor, calls a cheerful, “Excuse me!” to the subject of Vi’s fantasies for the past six months.
And, for the first time in those six, long months, Mystery Woman stops. And turns. And pushes her sunglasses up on top of her head so she can see who's calling to her better.
And then Vi forgets to breathe because, actually, the view of her from the front is even better than her side profile.
Even from as far back as she is, she can see Mystery Woman’s crystal blue eyes, the sharp bone structure. She looks like she’s been carved from marble by a sculptor whose artistic vision was “world’s most perfect woman.”
Reminding herself to breathe, because she’s about to pass out on the station floor and really give herself something to be embarrassed about, Vi notices for the first time that Mystery Woman is tall. She towers over Ekko as he gestures and she nods politely.
Shit.
Now Ekko’s handing Mystery Woman the piece of paper and pointing back at where she's still rooted to the spot by the stupid pod machine, and Mystery Woman flicks those incredible eyes toward her for the longest second of her life, one eyebrow arching upward, before she turns her attention back to Ekko.
She says a few words to him, he nods, saying something in response, and then Mystery Woman turns away in a flow of long limbs with a cheerful little wave, pulling her sunglasses back over her (beautiful, ridiculously blue) eyes.
Vi watches Ekko wave back, and then he's jogging back up the driveway and into the station.
Face fucking burning, Vi's mouth drops open as he shrugs.
“Problem solved.”